A poster flapped forlornly on the wall. The text across the top said "WANTED" in large letters. Below, a sketch showed the visage of a horrific witch, surrounded by grasping tentacles of hair. At the bottom ran a list of the crimes she was wanted for, including unlicensed song, rogue whistling, and attempted yodeling.

It was pinned to the outer wall of a Church of Chorus chapel, one currently empty and silent. This wasn't one of the scheduled days for a concert-mass, so that was hardly a surprise. This was a small trading town, north of Kelos and west of Jibu, even further west than the famous Tree of Life.

It mostly was a forgotten place, unclaimed by any major power, and it survived that way. People stopped at it for a generally unremarkable night on their way between other points of interest. Its largest claim to actual fame was being the northernmost extent of one of the Roadsmen's canals, and passing by one of their hard-surfaced highways. Sometimes people used the dock to change from one to the other.

Not today, however. For before any hero had come to the town of Crimearain, a 'recruitment drive' had swung through. Jibu and its client states were flexing their muscles again, for some reason. Valid slave targets included... any who weren't already under the Jibu system, and sometimes those who were. Many mid-level bureaucrats were entirely corrupt enough to allow that, for a fee.

Thus, the recruitment drive had swung through, gathering all too many of the town's young and hale. Worse, this seemed to be the less scrupulous sort, and the slavers had taken the chance to burn many of the buildings in town to the ground.

Any who were still here remained shocked, still coming to grips with the tragedy that had happened and had now moved a scant few miles up the road.

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Hello, make sure to have a link to your sheet somewhere in at least your first post. Feel free to ask questions (here, in the discussion thread, or in Discord) about the situation that might be relevant to Words or Facts. The idea here is to present a situation to get the PCs up and running, but to provide something to show off for our pantheon, some of the initial situation has already played out and it's just time to deal with it.

The woman in the vermilion cloak arrived in the town's single street seemingly from nowhere, heralded only by a slight breeze that flutters the wanted poster. She looks the other recent arrivals up and down, her hands on her hips and a nervous but determined expression on her face.

Chronicler Yue had scoured the lands looking for heroes, and asked them all to meet her here. It was only good luck - or bad - that there was need of them here. Given that, she was impatient to begin their work.

Abagai took a long look over the village. The devastation was awful. Certainly the worst she had seen to date. People openly wept in the streets as piles of splintered and charred wood lay scattered across the land.

"Now would be a good time for the teachings..." Abagai thought, closing her eyes for a second. "... yet, words continue to fail me. What do I say to these strangers, who know despair more than I ever have?" One in front of the other, Abagai mindlessly wandered the town as she thought of something, anything, she could say to these people.

Her thoughts were interrupted, however, when a red-clothed woman spoke to her. Abagai quickly shook her head and blinked. Much like before, Yue had suddenly appeared, seemingly the air itself. Abagai thought for a moment, trying to come up with something to say back to the mysterious Yue. And yet, her words failed her again. Turning her gaze away from the red-clothed woman, Abagai grunted in what could be construed as an affirmative.

That's because she has been both obsessed and dismayed over this wanted poster for the past five minutes. It's astounding how many of these things have spread through the region, and they all paint this ghastly portrait of her!

"This is too little reward money." She shakes her head and mutters to herself. "I'm a revolutionary, I'm worth more than this. I swear, the Church has become so corrupt that they won't even take me serious..."

The murmurs around her becomes too much to put aside anymore, though. So she turns towards that. To the destruction and panic. Yes.

There's certainly work to be done.

"Very well, we should begin." Virtue postures herself before her companions. Sparkling, flowing blue hair, elaborate white dress, a guitar shaped like a broomstick (or the other way around?). She looks ready to make a show of this.

"Loss of words? Do not fret. Our witch has words for all of us and then some to spare. Now, I think, we speak with action. There are people to free, and a town to help rebuild; good to do. Well, chronicler - where to begin?"

Yue stands up a bit straighter and tucks her hands into her cloak when Raoh uses her title, looking a bit more like the wise counselor she aspires to be.

"There's a great deal to be done to rebuild this village, but the structures are not the community." The way she says the last part implies she's quoting from somewhere. "Which means our first task should be to restore the community."

"Time is of the essence as well, so I propose we take action immediately. Pursue the slavers immediately, and get ahead of them. Then we can lay an ambush - separate their fighters from the slaves, then drive them off. I think Raoh and Abigai are best suited for the former, and Virtuoso and myself for the latter." Yue tries to keep the plan simple for now, since it's the first time they're working together.

Committing effort for the day on Best Laid Plans. This gives me the most relevant complication or threat to the plan's execution.